


Saving Mac in Afghanistan (An excerpt from the Private Writings of Jack Dalton)

by EWM



Series: Comfortember (myfirstone!!) [1]
Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: 2x12 Mac and Jack, Comfortember, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Jack Dalton & Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016) Bromance, Mac and Jack - Freeform, sandbox
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-02
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:14:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27339265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EWM/pseuds/EWM
Summary: So I am participating in Comfortember :) After Whumptober I need a bit of fluff and TLC. Anyway this is part of wider series of stories - The Private Writings of Jack Dalton.Jack recalls one of the times he saved Mac in Afghanistan. Let me know what you think! This is based around the flashbacks of 2x12 too :)Written with the below prompt in mindCOMFORTEMBER  DAY 1RESCUE
Relationships: Jack Dalton & Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016)
Series: Comfortember (myfirstone!!) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1996306
Comments: 6
Kudos: 24
Collections: Comfortember 2020





	Saving Mac in Afghanistan (An excerpt from the Private Writings of Jack Dalton)

I realise writing all this down about me and my adventures with Mac that I’m really doing this in the wrong order. I’m going back to front with everything we did, so I thought I’d try and remember a bit from our time in the sandbox because that was really when this all started. We spent a lot of days and nights together, but one incident that sticks out was early on. We’d been pushed together by our commanding officer, we both hated each other. God he was just…it’s hard to describe how frustrating he was, so arrogant in those days, so self-assured and weirdly annoyingly self-reliant. I had to drill it into him that was not how the army worked, that was not how we were supposed to work. The reason this memory sticks in my head is because I think it was probably the first time, I think it really stuck in Mac’s head or at least started too. We’d be stuck some tiny village somewhere in Afghanistan, I don’t remember the name now, but we had spent hours there and we’d have found nothing, nada, zip, no bombs and that was a good thing! I mean a day with no bombs was a good thing, a rare thing. I was ready and willing to go back to base, but Mac…no he wasn’t, man he was so annoying. He was convinced that one had to be there. We fought about it and I ordered him back (an order he should have obeyed) and he just didn’t…he just raced off. I’ll see how much I can remember of our fight, we were never exactly shy with words or shitting over each other in those days

 _“Last time I didn’t follow my gut, someone died. There’s a bomb here I can feel it and if we don’t find it, someone else will like another American soldier, or an innocent or a child.”_ And then just went off all on his own! I couldn’t believe it

_“Man, we covered every inch of this armpit and ain’t found diddly, let’s bounce! I ain’t trying to spend my last 32 days before being discharged in the stockade because my annoying EOD would rather follow a hunch than follow orders!”_

I remember swearing like mad (some of the locals got real scared) and stamping my foot (my ma might have been a little ashamed of this reaction). I know I sound like a broken record, but Mac was so arrogant and weirdly ignorant and so absolutely sure of his own mind. He was without a doubt the most frustrating bomb nerd I ever had to deal with it. God dammit it! At that point some nasty thoughts flittered through my brain. I’m not proud of this but I was like fine!, it was his funeral, he was being deliberately stupid. Eventually my conscience and possibly my ma’s voice in my head got the better of me and I like to think my own sense of duty. I had a job to do, watch out for MacGyver even if I hated doing it and even if it landed me in the stockade.

I caught up with Mac real fast, he was racing around corner, looking for his non-existent bomb. I wasn’t quite ready to talk to him at this stage, so I shot up to the third floor and set up my gun, good thing I did too because I was right (and so was the kid I suppose). Mac did spot something, but the soldiers heavily armed came too, they dragged him to his feet and well I didn’t hesitate, bang, bang and the four men were dead at MacGyver’s feet. I remember Mac looking so shocked, looking for the path of the shot I guess and spotting me in the window

“ _Did you just take out four guys with two bullets?”_ Mac said through the radio, sounding more than a little impressed. I resisted the desire to snort (very adult of me I thought). It wasn’t often I impressed Mac

_“Yeah, I’m trying to conserve ammo, now we need to get on the same page kid and I mean right now, that is if you want to keep breathing. Next time you wait for me to take my position before you go scampering off like that, you hearing me?”_

_“I didn’t think you were coming with me, thanks”_ Man how messed up was that? To be so fucked up in the head that he was willing to go die all on his own?

_“Yeah you’re welcome. To be honest you I don’t think I have the patience to break in another EOD nerd. Man it’s whip. Now hurry up and disarm that damn thing.”_

Mac needed no encouragement, he set to work pulling the monstrous little device apart all while I watched from the window. Although Mac was one of the slowest bomb nerds I ever knew, he was always kinda interesting to watch ( I never let him know this), the way he saw bombs was different, he just put things together in a different way. I guess that was why he was so good at disarming them. Mac took hours to disarm this one, well it felt like forever. Eventually he got it done. He radioed me and I came down the stairs, my annoyance had just about eased off at that stage. He smiled at me and I nodded, and we got back in the jeep. The conversation on the way back was strange

_“Thanks again…I mean I didn’t think you’d go with me.”_

_“Well you did just race off on your own, against orders”_

_“I was right though! There was a bomb!”_ (did I mention how cocky he was back then?)

_“And if I hadn’t been there, you’d have been shot before you could disarm it.”_

Mac at this point had the good manners to look at little embarrassed, I mean I was right. He could exactly refute that.

_“I guess I’m just use to people not trusting me, going off on my own. I figure if I made a mistake, it’s my head and no else’s”_

I remember being so sad hearing that comment, he was so weird in the head about all this. So I said probably for the millionth time by that stage

_“Look MacGyver, that is not how it works with us. We’re supposed to work together, I watch your back, that’s literally my job title…no don’t interrupt me. You don’t go off on your own, not ever. You always take back up.”_

Mac stared at his hands at that point (his go to when was embarrassed back then) and nodded. Mac was one of the bravest kids I ever knew, but sometimes he did need saving or I don’t know rescuing from himself. The sandbox is a messed-up place, your partner, your squad is always you’ve got. Most people got that real quick, it was a way of surviving, coping, I think. Whereas Mac, he was like nope, he can do it just fine on his own and well if he blows up, no matter, it’s his head so no worries. Man, it was tiring, trying to drill the crazy out of the boy’s head. I think I managed it though, although he never stopped driving me mad, he just found different ways to do it. 


End file.
